Real-time target and pose recognition for 3-D graphical overlay

Thesis (M. Eng.)--Massachusetts Institute of Technology, Dept. of Electrical Engineering and Computer Science, 1997.Includes bibliographical references (leaves 47-48).by Jeffrey M. Levine.M.Eng

Commercial Fishing Occupational Safety and Health in the Gulf and Agricultural Occupational Safety and Health in Graduate Medical Education

Background–The commercial fishing work sector continues to experience one of the highest occupational fatality rates in the U.S. There are regional differences in distribution of these events relative to fishery type, geography, and other variables such as cultural factors. Methods–Over the last decade, the Southwest Center for Agricultural Health, Injury Prevention, and Education has been exploring these factors and developing interventions through engagement of a vulnerable population of commercial fishermen in the Gulf of Mexico and forming strategic partnerships with numerous stakeholders, most notably the U.S. Coast Guard. This has involved a variety of quantitative/qualitative methods including focus groups, surveys, a community trial with quasi-experimental pretest/posttest intervention design, and development of a social media campaign to enhance adoption of personal flotation devices (PFDs). Results–Shrimp is a major fishery in the Gulf and earlier studies showed more than 80% of these fishermen are Asian, mostly Vietnamese. Culture plays a significant role in attitudes/beliefs among Vietnamese shrimp fishermen of the Gulf, and may influence behaviors that are risk factors for fatal and non-fatal injuries. In particular, commercial fishing industry leaders are able to influence behaviors and practices among fishermen. Over the last decade, safety tip cards, interactive CD instructional tools for vessel sound signaling and Mayday calls, and signage for a variety of safety concerns have been developed and disseminated. Statistically significant changes in attitudes/beliefs have been noted. Presently, identifying and assessing barriers to use of lifesaving PFDs (including heat stress), preferences of commercial fishermen for various PFD designs, and development of a social media campaign to promote use on deck are underway. Conclusions–Culturally appropriate training and awareness measures combined with recognizing normative influences can favorably alter attitudes, beliefs, and behavioral intent related to workplace safety in this population. Relevance to Public Health—Environmental health science represents one of the five core disciplines or competencies in public health and includes occupational health. This doctoral dissertation focusing on the commercial fishing work subsector addresses all three areas of essential services in public health, namely, assessment, policy development, and assurance. It has also formed an integral part of workforce development in the occupational medicine arena

An application of multiattribute decision analysis to the Space Station Freedom program. Case study: Automation and robotics technology evaluation

The results are described of an application of multiattribute analysis to the evaluation of high leverage prototyping technologies in the automation and robotics (A and R) areas that might contribute to the Space Station (SS) Freedom baseline design. An implication is that high leverage prototyping is beneficial to the SS Freedom Program as a means for transferring technology from the advanced development program to the baseline program. The process also highlights the tradeoffs to be made between subsidizing high value, low risk technology development versus high value, high risk technology developments. Twenty one A and R Technology tasks spanning a diverse array of technical concepts were evaluated using multiattribute decision analysis. Because of large uncertainties associated with characterizing the technologies, the methodology was modified to incorporate uncertainty. Eight attributes affected the rankings: initial cost, operation cost, crew productivity, safety, resource requirements, growth potential, and spinoff potential. The four attributes of initial cost, operations cost, crew productivity, and safety affected the rankings the most

Crustal Anisotropy from the Birefringence of P-to-S Converted Waves: Bias Associated with P-Wave Anisotropy

Many researchers have used the birefringence of P‑to‑S converted waves from the Moho discontinuity to constrain the anisotropy of Earth’s crust. However, this practice ignores the substantial influence that anisotropy has on the initial amplitude of the converted wave, which adds to the splitting acquired during its propagation from Moho to the seismometer. We find that large variations in Ps birefringence estimates with back-azimuth occur theoretically in the presence of P‑wave anisotropy, which normally accompanies S‑wave anisotropy. The variations are largest for crustal anisotropy with a tilted axis of symmetry, a geometry that is often neglected in birefringence interpretations, but is commonly found in Earth’s crust. We simulated globally-distributed P‑coda datasets for 36 distinct 4‑layer crustal models with combinations of elliptical shear anisotropy or compressional anisotropy, and also incorporated the higher-order anisotropic Backus parameter C. We tested both horizontal and tilted symmetry-axis geometries and tested the birefringence tradeoff associated with Ps converted phases at the top and bottom of a thin high‑ or low‑velocity basal layer. We computed composite receiver functions (RFs) with harmonic regression over back azimuth, using multipletaper correlation with moveout corrections for the epicentral distances of 471 events, to simulate a realistic data set. We estimate Ps birefringence from the radial and transverse RFs, a strategy that is similar to previous studies. We find that Ps splitting can be a useful indicator of bulk crustal anisotropy only under restricted circumstance, either in media with no compressional anisotropy, or if the symmetry axis is horizontal throughout. In other, more-realistic cases, the inferred fast polarization of Ps birefringence estimated from synthetic RFs tends either to drift with back-azimuth, form weak penalty-function minima, or return splitting times that depend on the thickness of an anisotropic layer, rather than the birefringence accumulated within it.

AdCraft: An Advanced Reinforcement Learning Benchmark Environment for Search Engine Marketing Optimization

We introduce AdCraft, a novel benchmark environment for the Reinforcement Learning (RL) community distinguished by its stochastic and non-stationary properties. The environment simulates bidding and budgeting dynamics within Search Engine Marketing (SEM), a digital marketing technique utilizing paid advertising to enhance the visibility of websites on search engine results pages (SERPs). The performance of SEM advertisement campaigns depends on several factors, including keyword selection, ad design, bid management, budget adjustments, and performance monitoring. Deep RL recently emerged as a potential strategy to optimize campaign profitability within the complex and dynamic landscape of SEM but it requires substantial data, which may be costly or infeasible to acquire in practice. Our customizable environment enables practitioners to assess and enhance the robustness of RL algorithms pertinent to SEM bid and budget management without such costs. Through a series of experiments within the environment, we demonstrate the challenges imposed by sparsity and non-stationarity on agent convergence and performance. We hope these challenges further encourage discourse and development around effective strategies for managing real-world uncertainties

Commercial Fishing Occupational Safety and Health in the Gulf and Agricultural Occupational Safety and Health in Graduate Medical Education

Background–The commercial fishing work sector continues to experience one of the highest occupational fatality rates in the U.S. There are regional differences in distribution of these events relative to fishery type, geography, and other variables such as cultural factors. Methods–Over the last decade, the Southwest Center for Agricultural Health, Injury Prevention, and Education has been exploring these factors and developing interventions through engagement of a vulnerable population of commercial fishermen in the Gulf of Mexico and forming strategic partnerships with numerous stakeholders, most notably the U.S. Coast Guard. This has involved a variety of quantitative/qualitative methods including focus groups, surveys, a community trial with quasi-experimental pretest/posttest intervention design, and development of a social media campaign to enhance adoption of personal flotation devices (PFDs). Results–Shrimp is a major fishery in the Gulf and earlier studies showed more than 80% of these fishermen are Asian, mostly Vietnamese. Culture plays a significant role in attitudes/beliefs among Vietnamese shrimp fishermen of the Gulf, and may influence behaviors that are risk factors for fatal and non-fatal injuries. In particular, commercial fishing industry leaders are able to influence behaviors and practices among fishermen. Over the last decade, safety tip cards, interactive CD instructional tools for vessel sound signaling and Mayday calls, and signage for a variety of safety concerns have been developed and disseminated. Statistically significant changes in attitudes/beliefs have been noted. Presently, identifying and assessing barriers to use of lifesaving PFDs (including heat stress), preferences of commercial fishermen for various PFD designs, and development of a social media campaign to promote use on deck are underway. Conclusions–Culturally appropriate training and awareness measures combined with recognizing normative influences can favorably alter attitudes, beliefs, and behavioral intent related to workplace safety in this population. Relevance to Public Health—Environmental health science represents one of the five core disciplines or competencies in public health and includes occupational health. This doctoral dissertation focusing on the commercial fishing work subsector addresses all three areas of essential services in public health, namely, assessment, policy development, and assurance. It has also formed an integral part of workforce development in the occupational medicine arena

Super Elliptic Curves

A detailed study is made of super elliptic curves, namely super Riemann surfaces of genus one considered as algebraic varieties, particularly their relation with their Picard groups. This is the simplest setting in which to study the geometric consequences of the fact that certain cohomology groups of super Riemann surfaces are not freely generated modules. The divisor theory of Rosly, Schwarz, and Voronov gives a map from a supertorus to its Picard group, but this map is a projection, not an isomorphism as it is for ordinary tori. The geometric realization of the addition law on Pic via intersections of the supertorus with superlines in projective space is described. The isomorphisms of Pic with the Jacobian and the divisor class group are verified. All possible isogenies, or surjective holomorphic maps between supertori, are determined and shown to induce homomorphisms of the Picard groups. Finally, the solutions to the new super Kadomtsev-Petviashvili (super KP) hierarchy of Mulase-Rabin which arise from super elliptic curves via the Krichever construction are exhibited.Comment: 27 page